


Pinky And The Brain

by tielan



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M, Gen, Humor, Maria Hill is a BAMF, Metafiction, Pepper Potts is a BAMF, Who Run the World?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-28
Updated: 2016-04-28
Packaged: 2018-06-05 01:16:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6683560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tielan/pseuds/tielan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You know, if we’d been in the movie, and the script had been written by a woman who actually likes women, it would have been very different."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pinky And The Brain

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, this is metafiction. Don't mind me, I've had this in my head for a month or so, and it would figure that it would only come out the night I'm going to watch Cap3: Civil War.
> 
> No actual spoilers were used in the production of this fic.

Maria glanced around as the door opened behind her, and the clack of high heels sounded on the cement balcony. “How was the premiere?”

Pepper drew up to the balustrade, her coat still firmly around her shoulders. “It was a premiere. There were lots of people, cameras, screaming. The movie was good, for your standard Hollywood version of good.” Blue eyes flashed sideways. “We weren’t in it.”

“Just in case I was wondering.” Maria murmured, turning around to looking back through the glass of the loft where the others were coming in, one by one. Steve was turned towards the balcony, and she saw him start to come outside and shook her head to indicate he should stay where he was. She didn’t want an interruption to her conversation with Pepper. Although, as she glanced down at the track pants she’d worn for the night in, finished off by the warm bunny slippers. “I’m starting to feel distinctly underdressed.”

“You’re sick. It’s understandable. And nobody in there will mind,” Pepper commented with a smile. “After all, Helen fell asleep on the couch, and that was actually in the last movie. This is just...a pocket universe. Admittedly one that’s becoming rapidly smaller. There’s not much room for the women like us in the movies.”

“Do you know if Gwyneth has signed up for the next _Iron Man_?”

“Are they making another one? I haven’t heard yet. But then, either way, a job’s a job and when you’re her age in Hollywood, you take what you can get.” Pepper sighed. “You’d think that sooner or later the executives would learn, though. Diana’s going to get her own movie before Carol ever does.”

“I heard they were considering Cobie for Diana once,” Maria mused. “That would have been interesting. Well, before the whole ‘Superman v. Batman’ debacle.”

“They do love their ‘heroes fighting against each other’ tropes this year, don’t they.” Pepper tapped her fingernails on the balcony railing. “You know, if we’d been in the movie, and the script had been written by a woman, it would have been very different. I wouldn’t have tolerated all that stupidity – on either side. Neither would you. And we’d have had the clout to pull it off in canon.”

“That would have been fun.” Maria smiled at the thought. “Unfortunately, it seems I’m relegated to unimportant character now; not even a bit part.”

“People looked more positively at you after the last _Captain America_ movie, didn’t they?”

“Yes, I suddenly wasn’t seen as the bitch who opposed the Avengers, and people were willing to grant me more personality than ‘ _I am here to do Fury’s paperwork and act like a rule-bound robot around the Avengers_ ’.” She lowered and flattened her voice for the mockery, then shrugged. “The turnaround was quite amazing. Although never very significant. I’m just not important enough – either romantically or in terms of character.”

“At least most people were willing to accept me as a major character in Tony’s life.”

“Well, you got a spike of interest after you disposed of Killian, too. Pepper Potts, superhero. What’s a mere administrative aide to the Avengers compared to that?”

“Which makes you wonder about people. After all, so many of them are angry about being politically sidelined, if you believe the hype this year – and yet they’re perfectly happy to push aside an Everywoman who’s canonically respected and trusted by the heroes, even in the stories they choose to tell.”

“Cognitive dissonance.”

“You might have to explain that one to me.”

“Cognitive dissonance is the contrast between knowing what you should do and what you shouldn’t, and doing what you shouldn’t anyway. It’s a peculiarly human thing.”

Pepper’s brows raised. “Really? That’s...scary.”

“Just a little.”

They stood there in silence for a few seconds, before the balcony door opened.

The balcony door was yanked open. “Okay, Miss Pink Elephant Pyjamas – dear God, I hope you didn’t buy that with the salary I paid you—”

“You mean the salary Pepper paid me?” Maria interjected, tugging the flannel around her a little more closely.

“—Because if I had a meter for tackyness, that would hit the red and then break it.”

There was a movement in the doorway behind Tony. “Are you okay?” Steve asked. “You should come inside, Maria. It’s cold outside.”

“Ooh, Rogers does creepy date rape. Oh, and he kissed Carter. The other Carter. And this time there was tongue. Can I watch if you decide to kill him?”

“Tony.” Pepper exchanged glances with Maria, and brushed her hand across Maria’s sleeve as she stepped back inside, pushing Tony back into the apartment and leaving space for Steve to step out and close the door behind him.

“Do I have to say sorry?”

“I’m pretty sure you were with Sharon back in the comics.”

“The comics was someone else,” he pointed out. “He had a different history, lived a different life.”

“True.” She reflected on it for a few moments. “I think most of the realistic people who started shipping us knew that it was a slim chance at best. They just...hoped.”

He looked down, a little abashed at the rolled sleeves of his shirt. “I made you shoot me down.”

“Not one of my more pleasant memories.”

“You wore my jacket at the party.”

Maria smiled, and pushed off the railings into his arms. “It was warm.” Like his arms were now, coming around her waist in comfortable intimacy.

“I liked it on you. Even if I didn’t get to show it on screen.”

“There’s a lot of things you don’t get to show on screen,” Maria remarked against his collarbone.

“Like this?” He tipped her chin up and brushed his mouth across hers. She deepened the kiss by opening her mouth to invite him in, and when she heard the wolf-whistles from the crowd inside, she gave them the finger without shifting an inch.

“Mm, yes,” she murmured when he finally lifted his head. “Just like that.”

Steve was smiling – a smile that dropped as she shivered slightly. “Okay, we’d better go inside.” He slid an arm around her waist and began herding her towards the sliding door of the balcony. “So, what were you and Pepper discussing out here before?”

Maria thought about how to explain it. “Mostly,” she said at last, “it was how we were going to take over the world.”

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> ...and now that I'm back from seeing Civil War, it seems I really _do_ have to write that fic where Maria and Pepper take over the world...


End file.
